“What's taking so blasted long, Stonehoof?” A tall stallion in brown gear stood behind his squatting companion. “The moon's almost out! We won't survive the night if you don't get that fire started!”
“Don't blame me!” Stonehoof hissed, his face grimacing and sweating as he fought endlessly to make sparks between two sticks. “Blame Turnip Red for dropping these sticks into the stream!”
“Blame me, eh?” A red-maned stallion charged up, snarling, only to be held back by two companions. “You're the one who knocked me off the wagon, Stonehoof!”
“The least either of you could have done,” grumbled another pony, “Was fetched some new materials along the way here. This mountain is too bouldery to offer anything.”
“Why are we in such a blasted hurry?!” Stonehoof muttered and fought with the stubborn task in front of him. “It's not like Windthrow will be gone by the time we get there!”
“You know that every day counts in this delivery!” The tall stallion uttered. He lowered his hood so that several threads of gray mane hair streamed from his thin neck. “The more we delay here trying to rest our worthless legs, the more those villagers have to contend with the unthinkable!”
“I swear to the Sun Goddess!” Stonehoof growled, his eyes twitching. “I've never had so much trouble in my life! If only we had some decent—”
Four blue hooves slammed into the ground before him.
Stonehoof fell back on his spine, his legs curled like a dead cockroach's. Several more ponies gasped and pulled glinting blades out from forelimb sheathes. The tall, gray stallion merely squinted at the sight.
Rainbow Dash stood among them. She had something in her mouth. With a smirk, she spat it out so that it rested at Stonehoof's tail.
Stonehoof sat up, blinking down at some dry flint and steel. He glanced up at Rainbow Dash in mixed relief and awe.
All around the camp, ponies murmured.
“Great heavens...”
“A pegasus...”
“Where did she come from?”
“I've always heard about them, but never before have I seen one...”
“Are those wings real...?”
Rainbow Dash merely smiled. Her eyes scanned the crowd. Finally, she saw the small stallion towards the rear of the group. The pony with a blonde mane caught her eyesight, then looked away. Rainbow Dash's attention was gathered by the gray figure of the tall, elder stallion marching towards her.
“It seems as if you have something that can help us in our time of need. Remarkable timing, stranger,” he said. “What's your name?”
“I'm crazy awesome,” Rainbow Dash spoke out loud. “Who are you?”
Chuckles broke through the crowd. Several wandering ponies shared smirks and watched as their leader stepped before the blue traveler.
“I am Fulltrot, leader of this caravan,” the gray stallion said. “We're on a trip to the village of Windthrow, east of here, to deliver some very important supplies. We're already behind by a day's journey, on account of some inclement weather we encountered.”
“Rain falls where it wants to,” Rainbow Dash said, then gave a wink. “At least when there are no pegasi around.”
More chuckles. The elder, however, was more curious than amused.
“How young are you, traveler?” He paced in front of her, his eyes narrow. “You sound no more than twenty winters.”
“I'm old enough to know a party that's screwed when I see it.” Rainbow Dash pointed a hoof at the unlit campfire. “If you don't get that blazing, you might as well kiss getting to Windthunk on time goodbye.”
“Windthrow.”
“Whatever.”
“And, no doubt, you would like some payment for lending your resources,” Fulltrot exclaimed, gesturing at the flint and steel.
“Hmmmm...” Rainbow Dash licked her lips and gazed across the camp towards the wagons. “I sure wouldn't mind a change of menu from the crumbs of bread I've been eating for a solid week.” She glanced back at the elder and smirked. “If I can afford it.”
His eyes were briefly resting on her goldent pendant with the ruby lightning bolt. Slowly, he nodded. “Yes. Yes, I do believe you can.” The stallion turned towards the group, whistled shrilly, and waved a hoof as he spoke, “Alright, stallions! We finally have the means for starting a fire! So no more lazing or slacking about! Let's get a meal prepared so we can rest sooner for tomorrow morning's journey!”
As Ironhoof sparked a fire to life easily with Rainbow Dash's ingredients, the many ponies wandered every which way to gather whatever dry leaves and twigs they could find. A dull, crimson light swam across the clearing, and Rainbow once again saw the golden mane of the lithe stallion to the rear. He was trotting briskly towards a cluster of dry bushes when two other figures roughly bumped into him.
“Where do you think you're going, Sun Plate?”
“Yeah, Sun Plate, what gives?”
The short-haired pony doubled back from their brutish contact, cleared his throat, and rasped forth, “What does it look like I'm doing? We need to start a fire—”
“Don't you mean WE need to start a fire?”
“Yeah!” The other large stallion chuckled. “You're on cooking duty, remember?”
Sun Plate groaned. “Again?” His voice cracked as he gestured towards the wagons. “I was stuck doing that the last three nights in a row!”
“And if you don't fly right, your face will be stuck in the side of the mountain!”
“Now get a move on, you stupid colt!”
“Heheheh...”
Sun Plate sighed, rolled his eyes, and marched in a lurching fashion towards the wagon. He glanced over his shoulder briefly to see Rainbow Dash's gaze catching him, and immediately he pretended to ignore her.
As the toasty aura of the campfire grew warmer and warmer, Rainbow Dash looked away from the wagons and smiled at Fulltrot. “So, Mister Tall Dark and Pale...” Her teeth showed in an excited grin. “What vittles ya got?”
Holy dialogue, Batman!
"I'm crazy awesome."
Yes, that would have been my second guess.
Dialogue! Dialogue! Dialogue! Dialogue! Dialogue! Dialogue! Dialogue! Dialogue! Dialogue! Dialogue! Dialogue! Dialogue! Dialogue!
Well it seems that whatever happened wasn't too traumatising. Dash is still making jokes and appears to still be able to trust others. That's good, I guess.
Oh. My. God. MUST KEEP READING
15 chapters of superb description of the scenery and stomach-turning, slowly-building suspense, then one chapter that manages to do the same, but with dialogue. I have a feeling that this story will be making it's home in the "favourite stories of all time" part of my brain :P
IIIIIt's Dashie's evaluation time!
In this chapter, we finally get some dialogue. Since Dash is still cracking jokes, whatever happened in the past to make her run away couldn't have been too bad. (Or maybe she's just puttingon a strong face.) Fulltrot seems to take some interest in the element of loyalty necklace, which could develop into something later on. Also, there are hints that the pony Sun Plate will be important as well as the story progresses. I get the feeling that whatever happens to Dash on the full moon will happen when she is around this caravan, which could get interesting. These are my thoughts so far.
-MASH
Dialogue? What is this madness?! I actually like the dialogue, though, and I agree with Emberspeak.
-THEpandaman007
t1.gstatic.com/images?q=tbn:ANd9GcQyvOSvyYVmSSSGar0XOyIIp9C38n6Ncx04d9jN0dbtp2RZIrvG&t=1
Dialogue! Ohmygod it's the holy Dialogue! All hail author!
Seriously, it was nice to have her talk, but it seems a bit wild, insane maybe. Idunno
Hm... This will be interesting.
HOLY SHIT!!! THEY'RE TALKING!!!
Good god....
It's probably been so long since you've used quotation marks, you probably forgot where they were.
Also, please, please tell me if this is based off this map:
dl.dropbox.com/u/100264180/Other%20Lol%20Pictures/Fan-made%20map%20of%20Equestria%202.jpg
You do the dialogue well, though much of the natural beauty from the story comes from the solitude and the blissful silence.
she IS crazy
Dialogue? Aww.
I still think she's an Oozaru. She's going to end up killing somepony.
i have never seen readers go this crazy about dialouge lol
So she is not broken beyond the point of speech with others, that's good. She also seems to be in a rather Rainbow Dash-y mood, so perhaps I guessed wrong about whatever it is that happened to the rest of the element bearers? But then she still needs a reason to be out here...
All in all, interesting indeed. Moving on.
I assume Stonehoof and Ironhoof are meant to be the same character. The name remains Ironhoof in all future chapters. Also, Sun Plate's name eventually settles on Gold Plate.
Fifteen whole chapters comprising several weeks of silence, mystery, wonder, poignancy, and loneliness since her departure, and of COURSE the first damn words out of Rainbow Dash's mouth are, "I'm crazy awesome."
This chapter was just too much.
Evidence! Evidence for my theory! These ponies are delivering ingredients to make a cure for the illness, which has spread so far already. I will stick by this until proven wrong.
And the dialogue is great.
So a fine kihutaja gave me instructions on how to get my links up all nice like. And guess what I did? SPRING! I DREW SPRING! And I'll say this, it is soooooo much better than Dizzy, probably my very best work so far and indisputably the best landscape. What better then that to try out the link advice thing. Ready.... GO!
http://alafreo.deviantart.com/art/Spring-427388677
ha, I think it worked. Thank K, i'm an idiot.
Also, FIRST DIALOUGE CHAPTER! He does it well, but still not amazing like imagery. but still good.
Hmm, I think this blonde pony might be important in the future.
Austraeohaiku
Flint
Can't start a fire
'Til she shows up, wows the crowd,
And eyes the lithe one
...What's this?
Dialogue?
In Austraeoh?
BLASPHEMY
Finally, voices. The voice - maker in my head was getting rusty.
What are those weird little double marks that keep wrapping around the words in this chapter?
It's all so interesting. I very much like the way you've established how large this world is. We're so far away from our familiar Equestria that the ponies are far baser creatures, uncultured and unrefined. "Sun Goddess", the surprise at a pegasus... a wonderful way to incorporate dialogue and rev up the story. You've finally caught me. I'm very interested in where your mind will take this adventure.
Interesting. Pegasi aren't a common sight, to say the least, and I assume neither are unicorns. So these earth ponies are probably the most common outside of Equestria (to the east at least). How do things get done? No one manages weather, there's no magic operated objects so that leaves....true electricity and machines?
AND WE HAVE SPEECH! Rainbow's awesome impression is epic, and Fulltrot is pretty cool. Though I do have to wonder about Sun Plate. What's got him on the bad side of everyone else? Or is it just his being younger? Either way, interesting, this be. More ponies, Awesome Dash, and a caravan with supplies.... What's next? Read on to find out! I know I am. :P
Oh, so they do talk (Yes I know I'm late to the party, shut up).
While it will probably make subsequent chapters easier to read, at least for me, I do hope that it goes back to the no dialogue/all description thing. It's something that's very interesting to read, and I'd like to see more. Considering the nature of the story so far, and the fact that rainbow is the only one tagged, I'm assuming having other ponies around won't be the norm, at least until later stories.
Speculation/wishing aside, phenomenal so far, can't wait until I get a bit further into it.
Oh no. Rainbow Dash better not gonna pay with her Element!
Never been so excited to see a pair of quotation marks in my life.
Dialogue! Blessed dialogue has been returned to us! That aside, Dash sure knows how to make an entrance.
~SolidFire
So, uh, slightly late. I actually flinched when I saw dialogue. I knew it was to come sooner or later, but damn, does it distract from the beauty of the world.
First dialogue, first contact with other beings that DON'T want to eat Rainbow in this story. Sounds like fun.
02/14/2017 01:04 GMT
Her first spoken words, appropriate as hell.
It’s so weird listening to dialogue with the text-to-speech feature.
Oh my god! DIALOGUE! WE HAVE DIALOUGE!
And it was at this moment that I realized this series is fucking awesome
I was starting to think this story would have no dialogue at all. Gave it a unique charm.
Was wondering what would happen once she met ponies.
It’s really weird to read dialogue after all these chapter without it, wasn’t even sure if this story would have any. I almost feel like Rainbow Dash who hasn’t heard voices for so long after reading so long without it.
Ah, so she's found travelers. Will she go with them?
they are SPEAKING
It really is a different experience after all the precedent chapter without dialogue!
Woo-hoo dialogue! And...characters interacting!
Helpful info for new readers:
Stonehoof = Ironhoof
Sun Plate = Gold Plate
Rereading again, my interpretation is that Stonehoof/Ironhoof's and Sun Plate/Gold Plate's names aren't mistakes or bad writing or anything that simple. They're fuzzy translations.
The logographic Equestrian language, in which Rainbow Dash's travels were originally recorded, which IC is diligently translating for our benefit, simply has very similar symbols for certain close-in-meaning concepts: Iron and Stone are written as two slightly different derivatives of a base symbol representing "Earth", and "Gold Plate" is merely a poetic kenning for "Sun". This early in the text, IC's grasp of Equestrian is still solidifying, so the translations of proper names aren't yet quite certain.